The mini-topic of last night’s Best Show was “the dumbest vanity license plate you’ve ever seen”. I wasn’t listening live, otherwise I would have called in with these two gems:

Gem #1: There’s a nondescript green Ford minivan frequently parked on my block or nearby in the neighborhood. It’s a total Soccer Mom Car, except for the personalized license plate: BACKSTAB.

So either this soccer mom is (A) a former member of The O’Jays, (B) a professional turncoat, or (C) a fucking maniac. Most of the time, when I see weird things in the street, I want to know The Why behind it. In this case, I have no desire to know what chain of events would lead a person to get BACKSTAB as their license plate. There’s no way that story doesn’t end in a depressing and/or horrible manner.

Gem #2: I was driving around Howard Beach, a neighborhood that virtually guarantees to show you something horrible/awesome. Cross Bay Boulevard was all backed up, so I took a left onto Pitkin Avenue. And boy, was I glad I did.

Parked on Pitkin was a Scion with a custom yellow paint job, the kind usually found on super-souped-up muscle cars. Except this was a Scion, a car that, even without a custom paint job, looks like a Cheez-It box with wheels. In yellow, it looked like large chunks of government cheese held together with toothpicks. And across the windsheild, in jagged No Fear-type letters: THE ASSASSINATOR.

I did four takes before I realized, “Wait, that’s not a word!” What’s even more hilarious is that I’m sure the detailing cost him an assload of money. Nine times out of ten, there is a directly proportional relationship between how much money is spent customizing a car and how idiotic it looks.

I pulled over across the street, because I HAD to have a picture of this. But then I considered the neighborhood and thought better of it. I had visions of some mook with a Dragonball-Z haircut jacked up on Red Bull beating me to death with a chain for mocking his car. Even without a photo, it will remain burned in my memory.